My internship at Nevada Court Appointed Special Advocates Association (CASA) introduced me to the relationship of state non-profits to their respective state legislatures. Publicly administered organizations are very different from non-profits, especially with how funding is received. Nevada CASA is a non-profit institution that needs to offer introductions and proposals to the state legislators for funding to pass. As such, I was tasked with data collection and sorting various data from other state CASAs in order to help my organization receive the financial assistance it needs. This is beneficial for those interested in the nonprofit sector and American state politics due to interactions with governors, legislators, and even the local programs in Nevada. For my fellow political science students, please choose this program if you are highly interested in state-politics and underrepresented or minority communities. There is no need for complex education requirements, this organization will not request you to do complex data analytics. There is no hypothesis you need to reject or fail to reject, it is only obtaining and sorting data. Fact sheets are appreciated in this line of work as data helps both the nonprofit and government understand the foster youth system, and what needs to be done to improve child welfare. I highly suggest working with Brookings institution, the library, former and current interns for this program. With all that said, unfortunately, I am not interested in this field. While I do love volunteer work and nonprofit, I gravitate towards international politics. I say this because I am studying war-crimes in post-Cold War conflicts through postmodern feminist analytical theory, using at most three cases for my paper. It made me understand that I prefer to research conflict and political economy for the future years to come. To secure a full-time position in this field, I recommend having a robust research experience especially in data. UNLV offers programs such as the Rebel Research and Mentorship Program, plus professors completing their research needs assistance with data collection. It is possible to search up these kinds of opportunities, and the Graduate College gladly helps undergraduate students out. If you are interested in working with a professor, please do reach out to them as I am sure they will agree or refer you to their, just as amazing, colleagues. The one piece of advice I can give to future interns is that this experience is a learning one. Even when it is not what you expect, whether it is good or bad, you will learn more about yourself than your work. You will learn what fits for you, whether this questions your goals, and maybe change or confirm with what you want to do with your professional life. I advise you to keep an open mind and learn. The photo that represents my internship experience is this little boy called Kotaro from the Netflix anime-series Kotaro Lives Alone. For a major spoiler warning, this little boy is from an abused family and inevitably becomes an emancipated minor at the age of four. While he may be fiction, the creator of this series truly wants us to understand how children mature with trauma, and how much they just want to enjoy their childhood as kids. This fictional character tells the stories of many abused and neglected children that CASA offers to help in seeking the justice and life that they deserve. Even when I am not able to see children nor be their volunteer, as I do not have the proper training, I know that my internship supported them one way or another. Who knew that collecting data turned me into a pretty decent adult?